Chrysler chemist touts alternative energy, criticizes opponents

Robert Sherefkin
Automotive News
August 10, 2007 - 12:45 pm EST

TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. -- A Chrysler LLC chemist today came out swinging against Japanese automakers, "Big Oil," OPEC, and environmental groups that want to block the widespread creation of alternative fuels.

These groups were among those that Loren Beard cited as the "five groups who want to stop alternative fuels and why we can't let them" in his comments here to the Management Briefing Seminars.

Big Oil, he says, has an obvious conflict with a new market in alternative fuel. "It will cut into their market share," he says.

Less obvious are the Japanese automakers. While not identifying them by name as a group standing in the way of alternative fuels development, he was critical of the "silver bullet car companies" who have focused their technology exclusively on hybrid vehicles. Toyota and Honda are focused on hybrids.

"Alternative fuels are necessary to improving fuel economy," says Loren, senior manager of fuels programs for Chrysler. "Automotive technology alone will not get us there."

He was particularly critical of some environmental groups. While not identifying them by name, he says they employ scare tactics against alternative fuels as a means of raising donations to keep themselves in business.

One such group, he contends, claimed that 800 million people would starve as a result of food products converted to fuel.

"We don't want to starve 800 million people, that is not Chrysler's goal" in pursuing alternative fuels.

Loren also disputed a claim that ethanol would cause more ozone related illnesses in Los Angeles than gasoline today. Another claim, he said, was that it requires hundreds of gallons of water to create a single gallon of ethanol.

These environmental groups, he says, "have no respect for real world economics."

Among the pluses of increased renewable energy sources, Loren says, are job creation for America's farms and the construction of fuel processing plants.

The alternative to these fuels, he says, is that continued dependence on foreign oil will assure that more than $20 billion annually "leaves the U.S. economy."